Transition Song: Circle Time Song by the Kiboomers (FYI: This is my favorite song of all the transitions songs I do throughout the year! The kids really get into it, and there is a lot of smiling.)
Materials: Laminated Letter S, two scarves for each child and adult, Jim Gill Silly Dance Contest. (And this is my favorite Jim Gill Song.)
Vocabulary and Concepts: Heavy/light, over/under, silly, stop, swoop, swirl, start, scarves, fast/slow, high/low, What questions.
Pre-literacy: Let's trace the letter S. Start at the top. Swoooop over, swiiiiiirl down, swooooop under and stop! What words have that /s/ sound in them? Soup, bus, snake, silly, sad, and a few of our peers have the sound in their names!
Activity: I pulled out a box of scarves (thanks, Miss Julie!) in bright colors. We threw them and discovered they are easy to pick up and don't fall quickly to the ground. They are not heavy, they are light. What is heavy? The kids named rocks. Yes, big rocks are hard to pick up. They are heavy.
We danced to Jim Gill's Silly Dance Contest song. This is a favorite with the kids and they know it well. But this time....we added SCARVES! We shook scarves, used them like skirts, put them over our heads (the room looks yellow/blue/red/green/orange/purple!), and waved them high and low. We threw them into the air. We traded scarves.
Do this at home: What is light around the house? Feathers, cotton balls, socks. What is heavy around the house? Big pots, bricks, weights, big books........look around!
Then turn on the Silly Dance Contest. Jim Gill is a lot of fun.
Also, look around for things that have the /s/ sound in them.
